Saturday August 6 @ 7 pm. ZipLine Improv! at Occidental Center for the Arts Amphitheater. Occidental native Laura Wachtel returns to OCA with ZipLine Improv, bringing you new hijinks and stories (and maybe even a song or two) all made up in the moment — led by your suggestions! ZipLine brings together some of the finest improvisers from around the Bay Area for your merriment. Tickets are $20 GA, $15 for OCA members@ www.occidentalcenterforthearts.org; or at the door. Bring your own seat cushion and enjoy our outdoor theater! Fine refreshments, art gallery open, special needs/access please email info@occidentalcenterforthearts.org. 3850 Doris Murphy Ct. Occidental CA. 95465. 707-874-9392. OCA is a non profit performing and fine arts organization with volunteer staffing.
Michigan’s Supreme Court has ruled that businesses, landlords, and others cannot discriminate based on sexual orientation or gender identity, even though the state’s civil rights legislation doesn’t specifically mention those categories.
The landmark 5–2 decision establishes that the bans on discrimination on the basis of “sex” in the state’s 1976 Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act (ELCRA) cover sexual orientation and gender identity.
In 2015, Michigan Democrats introduced bills that would have added explicit protectionsfor sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression into the ELCRA. The bills were blocked by Republican leaders. Michigan’s Supreme Court declined to hear an appealfrom Fair and Equal Michigan to have the 1976 law revised to include protections against anti-LGBTQ discrimination in 2021.
Writing for the majority this week, Justice Elizabeth Clement, a Republican, said, “Discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation necessarily constitutes discrimination because of sex.”
“Regardless of whether one defines ‘sex’ expansively or narrowly, the result of the textual analysis is the same: discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation necessarily involves discrimination because of sex in violation of (state law),” Clement continued.
“Our residents deserve to live in a state that recognizes the value of diversity and rejects the notion that our own civil rights law could be used as a tool of discrimination. This ruling is not only a victory for the LGBTQ+ community, but for all Michigan residents, and one that’s long overdue,” said Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel in a statement.
Arguing before the court in March, Nessel and the American Civil Liberties Union cited the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2020 ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County which affirmed that Title VII’s ban on employment discrimination due to sex also protects LGBTQ people.
The case before the state supreme court involved two Michigan businesses that refused to serve LGBTQ people: Rouch World, a wedding venue that refused to host weddings for same-sex couples, and Uprooted Electrolysis, a hair removal service that refused to serve a transgender client.
The Michigan Civil Rights Commission voted in 2018 to interpret the state’s ban on discrimination on the basis of sex to include discrimination against LGBTQ people. Following Michigan Department of Civil Rights investigations, both businesses filed lawsuits claiming that serving LGBTQ violated their religious freedoms.
In 2020, a Michigan Court of Claims judge held that ELCRA does not cover protections for gay and bisexual people due to a previous state supreme court decision in Barbour v. Department of Social Services, where the court ruled that the state’s ban on discrimination because of sex does not ban discrimination against gay and bisexual people. In his summary judgement, however, Judge Christopher M. Murray said that following Bostock Michigan’s civil rights legislation was similar enough to apply the same reasoning to the case involving anti-transgender discrimination.
“We are encouraged that the Michigan Court of Claims has ruled the word ‘sex’ in ELCRA encompasses gender identity, but we will continue to argue that the U.S. Supreme Court was right to conclude, as did the Michigan Civil Rights Commission, that ‘sex’ in this context is also inclusive of sexual orientation,” Michigan Department of Civil Rights Chair Stacie Clayton said at the time.
This week’s ruling establishes that ELCRA covers discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer individuals as well as transgender people.
Morning turned into afternoon. A scorching sun blanketed the concrete of the local sports hall belonging to the community of Zolochiv, a frontline village just minutes from the Russian border.
There, over the course of several hours, the International Committee for the Red Cross, with the help of local residents, unloaded over 20 tons of supplies for the besieged townsfolk. The town’s mayor, Viktor Kovalenko, who for the preceding five months valiantly rallied the community against Russian aggression, oversaw the delivery.
An unassuming bisexual journalist who had returned to the city where she was born just days prior reported on the mission. Natalie Vikhrov shadowed Kovalenko and his team, covering the delivery and interviewing members of the community’s health, humanitarian, and security apparatuses. She was there, next to the mayor, as the Red Cross pulled away and the Russian rockets fell.
As Kovalenko barked out orders and headed into the bomb shelter to help lead the response against the early afternoon attack, she stayed by his side.
As a bisexual woman, Vikhrov has learned how to “make tough decisions.” Born in Kharkiv when Ukraine was still a part of the Soviet Union, Vikhrov’s working class parents made the decision to leave for Adelaide, Australia when she was 8 years old. As the USSR crumbled around them, her parents “wanted a better life for me and my sister.”
Now comfortable with using both queer or bisexual to describe her sexuality, in high school “it didn’t click,” for her that she was sexually different in any way.
“We didn’t have the access to the resources and communities that we have now, as a teenager in Adelaide I didn’t feel I had access to anything that helped me figure out my sexuality,” Vikhrov told LGBTQ Nation.
Coming out “gradually” in her mid 20’s, Vikhrov also found her career goals change in the last year of college when a professor suggested she look into journalism as a profession. She began to pursue a master’s degree in Journalism, eventually taking a position with The Bunyip, a South Australian newspaper.
Remaining with them for almost five years, covering local community and political affairs, the daughter of both Ukraine and Australia “always wanted to cover international news and foreign affairs, but it felt like a distant dream.”
Although coming from Kharkiv and speaking Russian at home as a child, Vikhrov didn’t “have many memories of my childhood in Kharkiv” and ultimately felt “more Australian than Ukrainian.”
Then in 2014 the Maidan Uprising swept across Ukraine, Vikhrov got her first “taste of reporting on foreign affairs” when she left Australia for London to report on the story. With support from the paper, she moved there in 2015. In London, for the first time, she came out as bisexual, moving past the transitory wording of “bicurious.”
For Vikhrov there just wasn’t ”a reason to come out earlier.”
Natalie Vikhrov, interviews Sergy, who runs the Humanitarian Aid center in Zolochiv.
“Not every person’s experience is linear,” she said. “When people know their sexuality quite clearly, it is a different experience than being bisexual. For me [labels] are to explain to the world that I’m interested in both men and women. It’s just to notify people that I date women too. It’s more for other people, but labeling myself is for the outside world vs anything it did for my own self.”
“You continue the process of coming out with every new person you meet, and every new place you go. It’s completely valid for people to understand their sexuality and explore it.”
Vikhrov’s journey accelerated in the middle of 2016 when she made the leap from London to Kyiv, taking employment with the Kyiv Post, and bringing her back to live in her native nation for the first time since she left more than two decades prior.
Once she had full-time employment in Ukraine secured, Vikhrov began to look more closely at the LGBTQ community in Ukraine and “felt there was a gap in coverage.”
“I wanted to fill that gap,” she said, so she became a freelancer. It allowed her to explore the trials, tribulations, and victories of Ukrainians who weren’t as commonly visible in the media.
Having seen friends get physically hurt at the hands of anti-LGBTQ activists over the years, Vikhrov is “quite aware that there is still work to be done” for queer acceptance but acknowledges that “Ukraine needs to focus efforts on the war at the moment.”
Three days after the full-scale invasion commenced, she left the capital for Moldova before arriving in London once more, noting she “didn’t have security, a driver, a team behind me. I’m a freelancer on my own.” Yet, once more she returned to Ukraine, arriving again in May.
Why did she come back?
“I did it because it’s my job and because it was something I felt I need to do. I’ve been covering this country for years and I wanted to show what was happening here, what Ukrainians were going through.”
She then shared what has been the key driver of her life’s philosophy, and what originally led her overseas.
“I believe in approaching things that scare you, and part of why I ended up here was because I took a direction that scared me, and that’s important.”
A Republican lawmaker attended his gay son’s wedding just three days after joining the majority of his GOP colleagues in voting against a House bill that would codify federal protections for same-sex marriage.
The gay son of Rep. Glenn Thompson, R-Pa., confirmed to NBC News on Monday that he “married the love of [his] life” on Friday and that his “father was there.” NBC News is not publishing the names of the grooms, neither of whom is a public figure.
Thompson’s press secretary, Maddison Stone, also confirmed the congressman was in attendance.
“Congressman and Mrs. Thompson were thrilled to attend and celebrate their son’s marriage on Friday night as he began this new chapter in his life,” Stone said in an email, adding that the Thompsons are “very happy” to welcome their new son-in-law “into their family.”
Gawker was the first to report on the nuptials in an article published Thursday, the day before the ceremony, though it was not reported whether the lawmaker would attend.
In an email last week to the local newspaper Centre Daily, Stone called the Respect for Marriage Act “nothing more than an election-year messaging stunt for Democrats in Congress who have failed to address historic inflation and out of control prices at gas pumps and grocery stores.”
Thompson, who represents the state’s 15th congressional district, was one of 157 House Republicans who voted against the bill on Tuesday. However, 47 of his GOP colleagues joined Democrats to pass the bipartisan measure following fears that existing same-sex marriage protections could be in the crosshairs of the conservative-leaning Supreme Court.
The Respect for Marriage Act is now being considered by the Senate, where 10 GOP lawmakers must join all 50 Democrats to send the legislation to the desk of President Joe Biden. One of five Republican senators who has already confirmed a yes vote on the bill is Rob Portman of Ohio, who declared his support for same-sex marriage in 2013 after his son came out as gay.
The bill comes at a time when 71% of Americans, including a majority of Republicans, supports same-sex marriage, according to aGallup poll last month.
More than 20 Republican attorneys general filed a lawsuit Tuesday against President Joe Biden’s administration over a Department of Agriculture school meal program that prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
The challenge, led by Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery, claims that the federal government is attempting to force states and schools to follow anti-discrimination requirements that “misconstrue the law.”
The coalition of attorneys general are hoping for a similar result to a separate challenge from earlier this month when a Tennessee judge temporarily barred two federal agencies from enforcing directives issued by Biden’s administration that extended protections for LGBTQ people in schools and workplaces.
The judge sided with the attorneys general, ruling that the directives infringed on states’ right to enact laws, such as banning students from participating in sports based on their gender identity or requiring schools and businesses to provide bathrooms and showers to accommodate transgender people.
“This case is, yet again, about a federal agency trying to change law, which is Congress’ exclusive prerogative,” Slatery said in a statement. “The USDA simply does not have that authority. We have successfully challenged the Biden Administration’s other attempts to rewrite law and we will challenge this as well.”
In May, the USDA announced that it would include discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity as a violation of Title IX, the sweeping 1972 law that bars sex-based discrimination in “any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.” The directive requires states to review allegations of discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation, as well as update their policies and signage.
The agency warned that states and schools that receive federal funds, which include the national school lunch program overseen by the USDA, have agreed to follow civil rights laws. Although the agency says it wants voluntary compliance, it also has promised to refer violations to the Department of Justice. It is not clear whether the federal government would hold back funding for school meal programs as part of its enforcement.
The directive followed a landmark civil rights decision by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2020 that, under a provision called Title VII, protects gay, lesbian and transgender people from discrimination in the workplace.
According to the lawsuit, the attorneys general allege that the USDA’s new directive is based on a “misreading” of the Supreme Court’s ruling and did not provide states and other groups the opportunity to provide public comment.
The attorneys general involved in the lawsuit filed Tuesday are from Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia and West Virginia.
A spokesperson for the USDA did not immediately return a request for comment.
Either America is a country where fundamental rights are guaranteed, or we are a nation where your rights depend on who you are and your zip code. Those are the stakes right now, as an emboldened far-right political movement attacks federal protections for the rights to vote, access abortion care, marry the person you love, and more.
It’s a critical step forward, then, to see the U.S. House’s strongly bipartisan passage of the Respect for Marriage Act. The bill, which heads to the Senate, would ensure federal recognition of marriages between same-sex couples and interracial couples.
The bill’s passage comes after Justice Clarence Thomas’s chilling sentences declaring not just the Obergefell ruling ensuring the freedom to marry but also Griswold’s guarantee of contraception and Lawrence’s right to consensual same-sex relationships to be “demonstrably erroneous decisions.” He all but invited challenges to these historic precedents.
The Respect for Marriage Act evokes an earlier time in the long fight to win marriage equality. I have been replaying vivid memories of traveling the South a decade ago with our team at the Campaign for Southern Equality, standing with hundreds of same-sex couples who courageously requested marriage licenses in their hometowns to call for marriage equality, knowing they’d be denied. We worked with families in small towns like Morristown, Tenn., and cities like Mobile, Ala. I think about those who were plaintiffs in lawsuits striking down marriage bans in state after state. Those brave efforts worked — changing hearts, minds, laws, and our nation. Public support for the freedom to marry has grown steadily to now-historic levels, with polling tracking support at 71 percent. So many Americans have a close friend or family member who is LGBTQ+ and show their support everywhere from the kitchen table to the voting booth.
Despite this resounding public support, the LGBTQ+ community has been subject to a ceaseless assault from a far-right, Christian nationalist movement that exerts tremendous political power at every level of the American government. This movement has, through a mix of methodical strategy and deliberate chaos, seized the reins of the U.S. Supreme Court and almost every state legislature in the South. If they prevail in having Obergefell or other landmark precedents revisited or overturned, so many families and marriages would be at risk.
We must all be clear-eyed that we are entering a new chapter in the movement for LGBTQ+ equality. We’re already seeing the damage, especially in the South, which has been and will likely continue to be the epicenter for these attacks. Nearly every Southern state has passed laws targeting transgender youth for discrimination and exclusion. Parents who advocate for their trans children are being investigated as “child abusers.” The Texas attorney general has vowed to defend a 50-year-old law criminalizing homosexuality. A South Carolina congressional candidate called for LGBTQ+ people to be charged with treason. Even simple civic affirmations of LGBTQ+ people, such as Pride Month proclamations, are being censored.
We must harness the power of the supermajority of Americans who support LGBTQ+ equality. A record number of communities in the South have passed nondiscrimination ordinances, there is strong bipartisan support for LGBTQ+ protections, and countless Southern families are responding with love when a child comes out. For me, this is a source of very real hope.
The variety of hope I feel is not the buoyant stuff made of easy promises of what can be. It is, rather, hope that’s like a muscle you train until it’s strong enough for the work ahead, the kind made of prayer, grit, and crystal-clear resolve.
The stakes for our country could not be higher. Now is the time for us to take swift action in every part of our lives:
Individuals should take legal steps to protect themselves and their families and make concrete, detailed plans around access to health care, including transgender health care and reproductive health care.
Communities should mobilize funding, volunteers, and infrastructure for frontline work to support communities under attack.
At the state level, we should focus efforts on repealing “latent” laws, from so-called sodomy laws to marriage bans, that could be revived to challenge LGBTQ+ people.
Nationally, we must demand that Congress codify in federal law the freedom to marry who you love, abortion access for all, and the right to contraception — including urging the Senate to pass the Respect for Marriage Act.
We know what is possible if we prevail — and we also know what happens if we do not. This work is our charge. It is the work of our lifetimes. And it will take all of us.
Rev. Jasmine Beach-Ferrara is the executive director of the Campaign for Southern Equality. She and her family live in Asheville, N.C.
Republican governor Ron DeSantis has filed a complaint against a Miami restaurant after a video showed kids at a drag brunch event.
The Florida governor spoke about the video – which sees a child walking with a drag artist – at a Wednesday (27 July) news conference, saying that an investigation by the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation was conducted.
“They actually had agents going to this place and effectively just gathering information, getting intelligence, seeing what’s going on,” he said. “And what they found was not only were there minors there, the bar had a children’s menu. And you think to yourself, ‘Give me a break, what’s going on?’”
An administrative complaint accusing the restaurant of disorderly conduct was filed by the department on Tuesday (26 July), with reports that NBC Newshad obtained the complaint on Thursday (28 July). According to a tweet by activist Erin Reed, the complaint referenced a 1947 ruling that “men impersonating women in a suggestive fashion” is against the law.
“They are building the framework to go after all drag, and likely all trans people,” Erin continues in her tweet.
Clinical instructor Alejandra Caraballo also tweeted saying that the complaint was “setting the stage” for the revitalisation of “anti-‘crossdressing’ laws”.
“This is the foundation to target all visibly trans and queer people in Florida and use the state to enforce rigid gender norms,” she continued.
The complaint reportedly says that the video shows “what appears to be a transgender dancer” walking with a young girl around the restaurant while wearing a “‘g-string’-style bikini bottom”. The complaint also uses he/him pronouns despite saying that the dancer was “female in appearance”.
The original clip was posted on TikTok but had been shared by the notorious Twitter account LibsofTikTok which often shares videos ridiculing LGBTQ+ teachers and other marginalised groups. Those who are targeted by the account often receive an influx of death threats and harassment.
The Washington Post released an exposé on 19 April revealing the account owner to be Chaya Raichik, who attended the Capitol insurrection in January 2021. Reports later in the month suggested that Raichik had a long-running online friendship with Desantis’ press secretary Christina Pushaw around a month after he signed Florida state’s hateful ‘Don’t Say Gay’ legislation.
Since then, Ron DeSantis has turned his sights onto drag performances after Texas lawmakers planned to ban kids from attending drag shows on 6 June. The Florida politician then proposed a similar bill and also suggested that parents who take their kids to drag shows could be investigated.
During an 8 June news conference, he said that he had asked staff to look into a proposal, characterising drag as “really, really disturbing” and “inappropriate” for children to be at the show.
“We’re going to look to see what can be done under existing statutes, but I do think targeting these kids with all this stuff,” he said. “It used to be kids would be off-limits, used to be everybody agreed with that. And now, it just seems like there’s a concerted effort to be exposing kids more and more to things that are not age-appropriate. I think our state, Florida, we need to be a family-friendly state.”
San Francisco has declared a state of emergency, with the city in “desperate need of vaccines” as monkeypox cases skyrocket.
The US has seen around 4,600 confirmed cases of monkeypox across the country. Of these cases, 261 have been detected in San Francisco, representing around 30 per cent of all cases in California.
On Thursday (28 July), San Francisco mayor London Breed said: “We are at a very scary place. And we don’t want to be ignored by the federal government in our need. So many leaders of the LGBT community have also, weeks ago, asked for additional help and support and assistance.”
By declaring a state of emergency, San Francisco will be able to allocate more resources to fight the virus. Breed added that the city was in “desperate need of vaccines”.
San Francisco’s emergency declaration comes as earlier this week World Health Organization (WHO) said the accelerating monkeypox outbreak was a global health emergency, the health agency’s highest level of alert.
Monkeypox has spread around the world in recent months, however the outbreak is concentrated in Europe, and gay and bisexual men are disproportionately affected.
The health department of San Francisco, arguably the LGBTQ+ capital of America, has faced criticism for its response to the monkeypox outbreak because of a lack of public messaging and vaccine information.
The queer community and LGBTQ+ organisations have had to pick up the slack, with the San Francisco AIDS Foundation setting up a monkeypox advice hotline, and creating a vaccine waiting list, rather than forcing those at risk to queue for hours.
But state senator Scott Wiener, who represents the city, said: “San Francisco was at the forefront of the public health responses to HIV and COVID-19, and we will be at the forefront when it comes to monkeypox. We can’t and won’t leave the LGBTQ community out to dry.”
The most visible monkeypox symptom is a red rash with flat marks, with lesions soon rising and filling with puss, before falling off.
According to the NHS, other symptoms include a fever, body aches, chills and swollen glands. Symptoms can take between 5 and 21 days to show and bouts of monkeypox can last for weeks.
The Spahr Center is committed to keeping our community safe, including from the Monkeypox virus. That’s why we’re teaming up with Marin County Health and Human Services to host an LGBTQ+ Monkeypox Vaccination Clinic on August 6th. Due to vaccine shortages across California, we have only 48 vaccines available. To be eligible, you must be a Marin County resident age 18 years or older who also meets one of the following criteria:Gay or bisexual men and transgender people who have had multiple sexual partners in the last 14 days Sex workers of any genderAnyone with known exposure to someone who has monkeypox
Questions about Monkeypox?Equality California has lots of information on the virus, who is at risk, and what LGBTQ+ organizations and public health leaders are doing to keep our community safe. If you want to speak with someone at The Spahr Center about monkeypox (or HIV prevention), reach out to Romario, our HIV prevention navigator, at rconrado@thespahrcenter.org.
